“No!” The nine-year-old shakes his head, a look of absolute stubbornness settling onto his face. The kind might have called it determination, but there isn’t much room for kindness right now. “I can help! I can take ‘em, you know I can!”
His grip tightens on his sword-hilt, and the little genin glares past Mangetsu into the trees beyond. “I can do this,” he insists.
He doesn’t want to leave his brother to fight alone, not on a mission where they’ve been sent out together, even if it has gone wrong, even if they’re facing far more combat than a genin is expected to see.
Five days worth of travel. Three nights of rest, with four hours of sleep. Two meals worth of rations eaten on Itachi’s end.
But it was over. For now. His feet plant firmly on the top of Konoha’s wooden gates, glancing to make sure his partner has also made the trek up.
The barrier formula has not been changed. Their chakras lay completely undetected, and Itachi views the shapes below him move about. Unhurried. Safe. Secure.
“Remember. The Jinchuuriki is our only target.” But until then...they needed to locate him, and entering the village completely undetected was going to be the best shot they had.
Itachi doesn’t wait for his answer, stepping over the edge of the wall and allowing himself to drop.
[Set in the AU with @kakunosekai where Shisui and Suigetsu are the same age and have done joint missions -- and plenty of other things, ahem -- together. Dedicated to kakunosekai, and to the witless whiner in your inbox. <3
Note to readers: Explicit content beneath cut, as one might guess.]
A Bath Worth Remembering
He's come to kind of expect this bit, really. 'Just relaxing in the bath' has, for Shisui, too many times become an encounter with Suigetsu, so he barely blinks as his grinning lover forms up, sprawled atop his reclining body, and kisses him.
"Hello to you too."
"Missed ya," Suigetsu breathes, close to his ear. "Just couldn't show it before, all those fuckin people around..."
"So show me now."
And he's rewarded with a laugh for that one. "Haaah, back in command, taichou?" That sarcastically drawled title is an instant reminder, and Shisui's vision shifts, Sharingan forming up, every little bit of what he sees burning itself into his memory -- it can join everything else he's memorised, though fucking hell this is going to make baths difficult again for a while.
Suigetsu's eager, though, and glad to take that red-gleaming stare as proof of the effect he has on Shisui. The other proof's in his hand already, as he gives Shisui's cock a few strokes just to watch Shisui's expression change, hear his breath catch in his throat a little. "I'll show you, that's for sure."
He lets his body meld with the water again, and the whole tub of it is his, and he can touch Shisui all over now, pressure-ripples running teasingly over Shisui's body. Can't dissolve entirely, though, that would get in the way of his plans -- and Suigetsu sinks onto Shisui's cock, eyes going distant as he adapts. Just hydrified enough to make it easy, just solid enough that he can feel just how good it is, and he's as much grateful for as turned on by the moan that gets from Shisui, because it covers his own little noises, and he doesn't want to seem like he's lost control just yet.
Suigetsu's hands, mostly water-melded, run over Shisui's chest, and he grins, face a little flushed, but also slightly translucent. And he feels it like it's his own cock too as he pushes a condensed-water protrusion into Shisui, but the effect it clearly has on Shisui's even better. He's never done this before, and Shisui's eyes are so very wide, and he's gasping already as Suigetsu lets himself enjoy the thrill of riding him, and taking him, and touching him all over, all at once.
Shisui feels a little like his brain's whited out, there's so much sensation, and his last coherent thought before he comes is you asshole, how long before I can have a normal bath again -- but that doesn't matter right now, nothing matters except what Suigetsu's doing to him, except perhaps the satisfaction of seeing Suigetsu come undone too there on top of him. That cool I'm-in-charge attitude never lasts long once they both get really into it.
And then it's over, and Shisui's dimly aware that Suigetsu's behind him now in the bath, supporting him, running the fingers of one hand slowly through sodden curls.
"You can rest. I won't let you drown."
Feels like you already did, he thinks, but rest he does.
He woke to silence that day. There were no footsteps hurrying from one place to another, no hushed voices conversing, no doors opening and closing. Sasuke knew he was alone because he had been alone for almost two weeks now.
During the night, rain had fallen, splashed against the window of his room in comforting motion. Sasuke liked stillness because he wasn’t very social. He preferred reading books over chatting and thinking over voicing his thoughts out loud. But, given the lack of noise, Sasuke welcomed the little disturbances nature offered.
When he forced himself to sit up, he realized how tired he still was. It hurt his head to focus on things, and his eyes were puffy. The latter didn’t come from the lack of sleep but rather from his crying that had caused said lack of sleep. He rubbed his lids, wondering whether he should bother to find breakfast, but decided against it. He hadn’t bought groceries since that first time about a week ago.
His gut had been tight the entire way as if telling him he would throw up any moment. People had looked at him weird, but one woman had come up to him, asking if he needed help. He’d fled the scene, dismissing her, and had ‘hidden’ near the cat food for five minutes straight. He’d ended up buying some for the wild cars living in the now empty compound.
Slowly, Sasuke sank back down, then allowed himself to fall into his pillow. He didn’t want to do anything. There was nothing to look forward to, no one to see, nothing to do except ... care for himself. And train, obviously. He’d need to face Itachi in the future. Starting tomorrow, he’d need to attend school again, too.
His lower lip began to quiver. He turned to his side and rolled into himself. Cats did that when they slept, he thought. For that reason, he laughed before forcing his eyes shut tight. He felt like crying again but no tears came. He hadn’t drunk any water since several hours before bed.
They’re docked just south of Uzushiogakure at some run down port town, taking a few days to gather troops and distribute supplies. The official plan is to get to the village itself, take it over and disrupt distribution to the Land of Fire. The unspoken at any means necessary is a heavy weight that hangs over their heads.
They move out on the third day, a platoon of them traveling along an old rail line. She stays in the middle with the rest of her squad, though through the days travel she finds herself falling back beside Hozuki. He’s generally quiet company - poorly timed jokes aside - and her obvious preference over the noise the rest of their squad creates.
But there’s an early pause in their travel when they come across a small town not marked on their map. She doesn’t know if she would even call it that. It’s a small bundle of ten houses along a rivers edge, and from reports, another four two miles away. Nothing they couldn’t easily avoid. Nothing they had to raise their weapons for.
The order comes their way quickly. Her squad will stay. The rest of them will continue forward and rendezvous ten miles outside of Uzushiogakure.
Visna stares at the radio in her hand. This isn’t her first deployment. She knows how this works, but she had told herself, her stupid, ignorant self, that they were going to raze Uzushiogakure because they had to. There was a practicality to it. An enemy without weapon is an enemy who will not win the fight.
There’s no such thing in this. They’re just civilians. The sun has set and they’re most likely readying for sleep. Not for a firefight. Not for slaughter in their beds.
She brings the radio to her mouth, “Understood,” and signals for her squad to break away from the platoon and go left. Fourteen houses. Fourteen families.
Suddenly, she’s thinking of the men following behind her. Who would want to follow these orders, and who would want to follows hers.
